Worthless
by VeryMedical13
Summary: Step one: Ignore it. Step two: Look him straight in the eye. Step three: For heaven's sake, don't cry.
1. Chapter 1

**This is quite dark but I have wanted to write something like this for a long time. **

**I'd appreciate reviews, follows etc and I hope you understand where I'm coming from!**

**Follow me on twitter: verymedical**

**Anyway, here it is.**

"You're worthless"

Push

"No-one wants you"

Push

"Why would anyone want you? A doctor? Ha! Don't be ridiculous"

His face snarled in such close proximity to hers that she could count the beads of sweat dripping down his forehead.

One

Two

Three

Four

Five-

"Are you listening to me you fat bitch?!"

Step one: Ignore it

Step two: Look him straight in the eye

Step three: For heavens sake, don't cry

_You're strong. He doesn't own you. He isn't entitled to a reaction._

The man grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a rough shake. A nail in the wall stabbed her in the back.

Shake, stab, shake, stab, shake, stab, shake, stab, shake, stab, shake, stab.

She imagined the blood oozing out the graze. That crimson colour-the colour of passion, of love, of hatred.

"Now you listen here" He lowered is voice to avoid the inevitable 'concerned' neighbour's knock at the door

His breath reeked of stale alcohol.

"Mummy's not coming back tonight"

Now he had her attention

_It's not real. It's not real _

_It's not real. It's not real _

"And you know what that means, don't you"

_No. Please don't let this be real._

_I promise I'll be good._

_I'll do really well in my exams. _

_I'll do all the chores, I won't go out late, I'll never shout ever again._

"LOOK AT ME!"

She snapped her head so she was looking directly into his blood-shot eyes.

"Please don't" She mumbled incoherently.

She couldn't believe she'd let things get like this again. It had been the same ever since she was seven and mum had brought back Barry from the pub. He had smiled at her and said what a pretty dress she was wearing. She really liked him because he paid her the attention she craved - he said she was clever. When he asked her to twirl, she did. When he asked her to try on a new dress, she did. When he asked her to take her dress off, she did.

As she grew older he become more and more interested in how pretty she was, and less interested in how clever she was. The first time he'd actually… _done it _she was nine. Her mum was out which meant he had to tuck her into bed. Only, he got into bed with her. The stench of his odour overpowered her safe haven of duvet and blankets. He crawled into the single bed, squishing her against the wall. He wrapped his arms around her and…

Well, she knew the ending. It ended the way it always ended. Her lying on the bathroom/bedroom/living room floor, tears in her eyes and the inability to walk. However, the pain between her legs was nothing compared to the guilt. It was the guilt that plagued her every waking thought. What if her mum found out what she'd been doing? What if she found out what a disgusting daughter she had? What if she found out what a failure she was?

She was twelve now and she wasn't some small, innocent child. That made it worse. She didn't own much, but this secret was her most prize possession and she guarded it like gold.

"Now, do I have to do this the hard way or the easy way?" He said almost gently, flashing his yellow teeth at her.

He slowly place one hand on her hip, the other on her neck.

"Be a good girl, come on now"

She let him take her hand as he led her into his and mum's bedroom.

The familiar choking feeling inside her threatened to rear its ugly head but she forced it down. It was almost easy now; she'd had plenty of practice. Crying means weakness, everyone knows that.

And it was at that moment, in the door way that she decided to prove everyone wrong. She decided on two things:

1) No matter what it took she was going to become a doctor.

She was going to be the best damn doctor the world had ever seen.

2) No-one would ever find out what a worthless little girl she was.

And it was those two things the twelve year old girl carried with her. They were her aims, her goals. No matter what life threw at her she didn't give them up. And now at the grand old age of thirty-five they were still with her.

She never told anyone what they were, not the councillors, the social workers, the doctors. They wouldn't understand. She needed to have control over what she did and if that meant never telling anyone then so be it.

The only thing was she couldn't let them go. She did anything to be the best. Cheating, lying, stealing. You name it, she'd done it. But now, in the cold hard light of her miserable existence it wasn't proving to be worth it.

She still wasn't worth it.

She wasn't worth anything.

She was _worthless._


	2. Chapter 2

**Okay, so I actually wrote this before I wrote the last chapter. However, I think this fits in well and will allow me to continue this story on. Thank you for all the reviews last chapter and sorry for the spelling/grammar mistakes towards the end- I was very tired! **

**I hope you enjoy this chapter and I'll try to update some of my other fics later in the week (Exam revision procrastination yay).**

**Please review, favourite, follow. Most importantly Enjoy!**

"Have you ever actually tried?"

"No"

"Well, no time like the present. Breathe in."

"What? You really expect me to-"

"Do it. Now."

"Fine"

She breathes in….

One

Two

Three

Four

Five…

Six SevenEightNineTen

She sighs

"This is stupid"

"No it's not. You need to learn to control your anger" Her Boss replies, as cool, calm and stubborn as ever.

She grits her teeth

"Well, it would be a lot easier if you didn't patronise me with your stupid exercises only fit for five year olds" She mutters angrily

"Pardon?" He replies ever so politely.

_No-one ever listens hard enough to hear me._

"Nothing. Thank you for the self help but I think you'll find I've coped well enough up till now without you, or anyone else for that matter sticking their nose into_ my_ business. "

She gets up to leave. He stands up.

_God, he really is very tall._

"Get out of my way"

She leans forward so much she nearly head butts him in the chest. He raises his eyebrows and makes no attempt to move.

"Please!" She exclaims rolling her eyes.

"This isn't the end of it" He swiftly moves aside, accepting defeat on this one.

"Oh I think it is"

She narrows her eyes in frustration resisting the sudden urge to turn back and yell a torrent of abuse at the man. Instead, she opens the door and storms into the corridor squeaking her trainers as loudly as possible.

Then he says something. Something so terrifying she is physically rooted to the spot. He says the words she's dreamt about hearing for twenty five years. Those two small words that would make everything better and everything so much worse at the same time.

He says

"I know"


	3. Chapter 3

There is nothing she can do. She is utterly paralysed. Her body refuses to move and her feet suction onto the ground so viciously, even her animal instinct to run as far and as fast as possible proves futile. Blood pumps ten times louder and harder through her veins. Her chest contracts to what feels like the size of a pea as the oxygen she craves so badly floats sparingly in the air. She's never been the type to openly admit words could have such an effect on her physical being, but in that moment as the very marrow of her bone freezes to ice – she has never been so scared.

Of course, this does not last long. Within a few nano-seconds she has recovered and upon deciding not to turn her head and completely ignore the man (and his words) she slowly, calmly rotates her rigid back to face the wall and turns to face him head on.

"What" She says, her face tightly contorted into a 'neutral' expression.

The triumphant smirk playing on his lips wavers as he considers the impact his sudden revelation is having on the woman. He knows only too well the internal struggle and self-control it takes to conceal sheer terror when present in the work place. A sudden burst of admiration radiates from within but of course he expertly covers by returning to his safety-net blank stare. They continue to hold each other's gaze for much longer than would seem appropriate by hospital gossips. But for those two people, standing facing each other – this isn't just a place of work. This hospital is a place to escape, to feel wanted, _needed. _He knows it. She knows it. They would just never admit it to one another. Their personalities hold so many parallels; they are each a reflection of what the other wished never to become. However, they failed in that particular arena a long, long time ago.

The tone has turned sour now and the corridor seems but greyer, longer and more sinister than ever before. Without changing pitch Jac Naylor solemnly asks

"Know what?"

Her expression falls as flat as her hair framing her face. She already knows the answer to the question but what's left of her naivety can't help but wish with all her might that she is wrong.

Hanssen refuses to show what he's thinking. For this, they both need time and now in the middle of a busy ward neither of them has the precious time or energy needed. He resolves to use his voice he conserves only for the most serious of hospital politics and funerals.

"I think you and me need to have a little chat in my office. Don't you, Miss Naylor?"


	4. Chapter 4

**Hi everyone, here is chapter 4. I'm not entirely happy with it but I feel like I owe it to all you wonderful people who left such lovely reviews on my last chapter to upload at least something. I'm sorry it's not very long either. Please review it none the less and I hope you enjoy!**

11.00pm.

Finally, after the grueling shift that seemed to stretch from one end of eternity to the other, Jac finished for the day. Hanssen's threat of a chat never straying far from the forefront of her mind. Her concentration levels had been all over place in the last 15 hours which was not particularly helpful when Darwin was full to the brim with people needing their hearts fixed. She'd got through it though, like she always did. No matter how badly her head throbbed from lack of sleep or how idle/absent her so called 'team' was, she reminded herself; this is what she chose. This is what she _wanted. _This whole fixing-other-people thing she had going on was good. She was good. However, no matter how many times she was commended for her talents or commitment or hard work, it still wasn't enough. She wasn't enough. Her internal dialogue was, by default always going to overpower any praise she received. Every shift was the same, she always failed in some way because after all Jac Naylor wasn't capable of achievement - she only ever seemed to stir up negative emotions in people.

Anyway, here she was at the end of her shift. There were no patients to hide behind or any medical jargon to cover up how nervous she was. It was her and the Swede. His office door loomed more menacingly than ever, the polished wood reminding her of the man who lay (or more likely sat) beyond the door. The man who would potentially rip right through the years of hard work it had taken her to build her facade. They'd had moments similar to this before, the faceless apartment in Stockholm somehow acting as a canvas for all his secrets to slowly worm their way out into the open. She didn't know how many people he'd told, just that she was one of the few, and even that was simply because she happened to be in the right place, at the right time. Maybe he would have said exactly the same to Serena if she had been the one to make the treacherous journey across Europe to rescue the broken man who needed fixing.

"Ms. Naylor, may I ask how long you have been loitering outside my office?"

The man himself miraculously appeared, looking as smart as ever despite the lateness of the hour.

On the other hand, she had just changed out of her scrubs but hadn't had bothered to brush her hair or sort out her makeup. Not that he would bother about that, it just added to her sense of inferiority always conversing with someone who looked like they'd stepped straight out of a suit shop.

"I don't loiter" she fired back, all thoughts of his previous vulnerability completely out the window

"Please, take a seat" He smoothly replied, hardly giving her time to react before he turned his back and left her to enter the office herself.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Ms Naylor entered the all too familiar office with as much gusto as she could summon. Everything looked as usual, the wide, glass table in the centre of the room; the abstract paintings on the walls; the frighteningly tidy desk with the neatly aligned pens at which Hanssen was now sat behind. Places like these brought back unwanted memories. Not just of nearly getting sacked (which even Jac had to agree happened on a worryingly regular basis), but of before her days as a doctor. To be more precise, her time in care. She'd been carted around from pillar to post and when things didn't work out…ended up in an office identical to the one she was now sat in. Six years she'd spent as an orphan, but it had felt more like sixty. Jac shuddered at the memory.

"Get lost Jacky" Heloise drawled in her French accent. She deliberately elongated the word "Jacky" because she knew it would set her off.

"That's not my fucking name." Jac replied, through gritted teeth; surprisingly calm for the situation she had found herself in.

However, this was just the calm before the storm. Underneath, she was seething with irrational hatred for the girl, three years her senior, for undermining the respect it had taken her over half a year to gain. She was thirteen now and this meant she was to be treated like an adult. The care home catered for 10-16 year olds so, when she had arrived, last September she had been at the bottom of the pecking order. Most of the kids she found herself living with were veterans in their field. They had grown up with no-one to look out for them, no hope of a better life. They had to look out for themselves.

Jac turned away from the spiteful teenager and plonked herself down angrily on the alarmingly red sofa at the far end of the office.

"I'm not leaving until I find out why you were looking through _my_ file" Jac demanded "We're not even supposed to have them"

"That's never stopped anyone else" Heloise scoffed and kicked the forbidden folder with her toe. It was now abandoned on the floor, between them both.

The room fell silent as neither really knew what to do next.

"You had no right" Jac muttered - almost to herself.

She bent down to retrieve the red, dog-eared folder. The one that had passed through a million social worker's hands. Her entire life was in that folder, or at least what people thought was her life. Most of it wasn't even about her. It was about her 'incompetent mother' or 'abusive step father' as they'd put it. Even the document that supposedly defined her as an individual was a fraud.

She knew this because, yes, she'd seen it once or twice. Mainly out of curiosity; she wanted to know which secrets were still safe.

"So what did you find out then?" She asked the girl, almost defeated by the effort it had taken to pick it up.

"Oh nothing much" the girl replied "nothing I haven't seen before at least"

A pang of emotion hit Jac like a slap in the face. She couldn't quite work out what it was: Hurt at being betrayed? Embarrassment by the invasion of her privacy? No... it was...disappointment. She was disappointed because she wasn't special. 'Nothing much' - that was how the girl described her.

Nothing much.

Yeah, that pretty much summed her up.

That was probably why her mother had left, without warning one day and never come back. She wasn't even worth staying for. The tears that threatened to break the surface of her already rather icy exterior were nothing compared to the pain she felt. The terror of that morning when she had woken up and frantically searched the house for something - anything - worthy of a clue as to her mothers whereabouts. There was nothing. The panic that had gripped her very being during that morning had never quite faded. She seemed to live in a constant state of trepidation and anxiety which she had learnt to mask with snide comments and bitchy remarks.

However, the false persona she paraded around during the day couldn't last forever. At night, the scared little girl would materialize and the monsters would return to haunt her.


End file.
